


zero stamina

by ohvictor



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen or Pre-Slash, Hurt/Comfort, ventfic (?)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:21:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22350250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohvictor/pseuds/ohvictor
Summary: Itaru has a meltdown at work. Chikage seeks him out.
Relationships: Chigasaki Itaru & Utsuki Chikage, Chigasaki Itaru/Utsuki Chikage
Comments: 4
Kudos: 181





	zero stamina

**Author's Note:**

> o/ i wrote this in august (according to the doc history) but didn't post it bc... it feels too self-indulgent, or something. but a3 week 2020 has a prompt for hurt/comfort so i figure i can be a little self-indulgent under that guise (even tho i wrote this months ago...). this can be read as shippy or not. thank you to goomba server for ~~enabling~~ supporting me always ;v;
> 
> in terms of content/warnings: this takes place after part 2 of the main story (i.e. chikage is there), and there's a blink-and-you'll-miss reference to kniroun. also, this includes a pretty detailed depiction of a panic/breakdown, particularly in the beginning, so please be careful!

As the day wears on it grows harder and harder for Itaru to concentrate. Today all he has to do is desk work; all he has to do is sit at his desk and type on a computer and use his brain in short increments. Scan and compile files. Update spreadsheets. Email his supervisors. It should be easy. 

The guilt, the shame that all he has to do is this _one easy task_ and he _can’t_... That isn’t helping either. 

The computer screen floats in front of his unfocused eyes. He belatedly remembers that he has hands that can work the keyboard. He looks at the clock at the bottom of his computer screen; it’s only been two agonizing minutes since he looked last. 

The cold recycled air in the office sticks inside his chest, makes hair stand on end on his arms and neck. The computer whirs under his fingertips. There’s so much sensation around him, but none of it penetrates the scattered fuzz of his brain. 

Attempts to regain focus have thus far been unsuccessful. He’s starting to get frantic in that subterranean way, an implosion no one, including him, can feel or see. The cavern of his chest and lungs is collapsing inside him, supports splitting and dams breaking, and he feels nothing. His eyes water the longer he stares at the fluorescent computer screen, and he feels nothing. His foot is jittering so hard under the desk that the whole cubicle is vibrating, and he feels nothing. He can’t breathe, and he feels nothing. He’s biting his lip so hard he feels the telltale slide from pressure to pain, and he feels nothing. 

He needs to get out of here. 

Itaru launches himself up from his desk chair, waving an arm towards the hall in case anyone’s watching him, and bolts for the door. His wrist catches on the corner of his cubicle divider, tearing a trench into his skin—the pain is easy enough to ignore, to distance himself from, but his brain starts screaming, _useless, idiot, you deserve that pain_ , and Itaru pushes himself out of the room faster before he breaks down in front of everyone. 

There’s a bathroom down the hall, Itaru’s usual haunt when he needs to grind or check his rank. It has two stalls and it always smells faintly like body odor, despite the rotating cast of air freshener cans that Itaru knows his coworkers spray liberally in the bathroom air. 

He locks himself in the smaller of the two stalls, sits down on the closed toilet lid, and presses his hand flat against his diaphragm, trying to force air in and out of his lungs. All this accomplishes is a shooting pain in his chest. Itaru’s eyes well up with tears, and it’s a catalyst; once he starts crying he can’t stop. Like the dismal state of his brain was a pile of miserable dry kindling, the flash of pain in his chest a lit match dropped carelessly on top. 

At least now he has something to focus on, namely, keeping his crying as quiet as possible. This is something Itaru’s always been good at. If he cried at home within earshot of his sister, he was liable to receive a scolding, or at least an unsympathetic jab. If he cried at school, it just fit his sickly image; people assumed he was having a bad illness day. Well, not that they were that far off the mark. Now, if he cries at the dorms, there are people around who’ll fuss over him, or ask what’s wrong, or just sit by him and wait it out. Or leave him be until it subsides. 

The thought of being back at the dorms, in his bed, with Banri or Chikage just a text away, nearly makes him bawl. The fist of his chest clenches tighter, and he can barely suck in enough stale air to keep from growing lightheaded as his body is wracked with sobs. He loses his balance and tilts sideways, his shoulder crashing against the stall divider, and the pain startles a shaky sob out of him too loud to mistake. If anyone’s in earshot, his cover’s blown for sure. 

“Chigasaki?”

Shit. 

Shit. 

His luck stat must be practically in the negatives today if Chikage’s just come into the bathroom, _this_ one out of all those in the building, and _now_ , when Itaru’s facade is in pieces. How did Chikage find him—doesn’t Chikage work on another floor? And never mind that, how could he guess Itaru’s identity by _one_ sound?

He prays his voice is sufficiently muddled by crying and sucks in a deep breath. “You’ve got the wrong guy...”

From outside the stall, Itaru hears Chikage laugh wryly. “Nice try. Will you let me in?”

 _He means the stall_ , Itaru reminds himself. That’s something he can do. He looks down at his hands, blurred and shaky, and with a great deal of effort he stands up and makes his fingers undo the latch on his stall door. 

The door doesn’t swing open immediately, but Chikage must have been waiting for the sound, because as soon as the door’s unlocked and fallen an inch open, Chikage’s fingers curl around it and open it just wide enough to admit his slim frame. He closes and latches the door firmly behind himself, and starts to turn to face Itaru, but he doesn’t get very far before Itaru grabs onto Chikage from behind and buries his gross, snotty face in the back of Chikage’s jacket. 

“Chigasaki,” Chikage says, and the exasperation in his tone is a knife in Itaru’s chest. Itaru just wanted Chikage to not see his face like this—he’s always known he looks awful when he cries, all blotchy and drippy, and his sister has never been shy about pointing this out to him on the rare occasion that she caught him in the act. If Chikage says something about Itaru’s face, Itaru feels like he’ll shrivel up and die. Though, on second thought, that might be an easy way to get it the fuck over with, huh. 

“You’re going to get my suit jacket messy,” Chikage says, although Itaru notes he’s not making any move to remove Itaru from his back. 

“Take it off later,” Itaru mumbles. 

“Wouldn’t you prefer a shoulder to cry on, not a back?”

“Doesn’t matter to me.” He hiccups, and that alone, that embarrassing sound, summons a fresh wave of tears. He sucks in a breath that seems to turn his lungs into a pinball machine, the breath getting caught on every possible lever and barrier as it fills his chest. He grabs at the back of Chikage’s coat as if it could ground him. “Why are you here.” 

“I work here,” Chikage says. There’s something in his tone Itaru can’t place. He doesn’t like it. “I had to use the bathroom.”

“You work two floors up.”

“Enough about me,” Chikage says. “Let go of my jacket.”

Surprised, Itaru drops his hands. 

Chikage turns around, and his eyes meet Itaru’s. That feeling Itaru couldn’t identify in his voice is writ large on his face — it’s pity, or. Maybe something like compassion. Chikage spreads his arms, opening a space between them, a refuge. “Get all your tears out here. Being held can help people feel better. Then, if you want, we’ll pretend it never happened.”

It’s so clumsy, so clinical — _so typical Chikage_ , Itaru thinks — but Itaru’s tipping forward before he can think twice about what he’s doing. He mushes his face into Chikage’s shirt, his hands skating up the front of Chikage’s coat to grab his lapels and hang on. As promised, Chikage curls his arms around Itaru, a tight embrace that makes Itaru feel like all the crumbling parts of him are held together. 

He was so surprised before that his crying stopped, but being held firmly like this makes the waterworks start again. His body aches from his exhausting morning, the fatigue of having to be alive and go to work and be a person, and his lungs ache from the effort of keeping all of this pressure clamped inside. Like a tapped spring, tears stream from Itaru’s eyes, and his chest hurts too much to bother muffling his sobs with anything except Chikage’s shirt. If he wasn’t at work, he could practically wail with it. It’s humiliating, but Chikage said they could never talk about it again, and... That’s damn near perfect. 

He tries not to feel pathetic — as he clings to Chikage and cries in a bathroom in the middle of the workday. Yeah, right. Zooming out like that makes his chest hurt and his body feel small, so he manually shifts his focus instead to smaller sensations. The crisp fabric of Chikage’s shirt against his face, the hot tears burning his eyes and cheeks, the heaviness in his chest, the frantic heartbeat in his ears, almost drowning out the sound of his own crying. Almost. He can hear the gasp of his breathing, and distantly, he hears Chikage’s breathing too, a much calmer pace. 

He won’t cry forever. The tears wash away the tension and anxiety in his chest, leaving him desiccated, like a barren floodplain. Itaru slowly comes back into his body, sensations returning to him secondary to the ache in his chest and his bones. His nose is completely clogged, and when he tries to sniff, he ends up coughing. He hears a puff of air as Chikage laughs at him, and then Chikage unwraps one of his arms from around Itaru and grabs a wad of toilet paper, which he thrusts into Itaru’s face. Itaru huffs, and takes it. He blows his nose with a honk louder than any of his crying, and Chikage puffs again, this time almost a true chuckle. 

“Don’t laugh,” Itaru sulks. He wipes at his eyes with the rest of the paper and then tosses it into the toilet behind them. 

“That did nothing,” Chikage says. “Your eyes are super swollen.”

“I just cried, genius.” Itaru’s surprised to find his chest is lighter now, enough to manage a less than serious statement. Usually after spells like this he feels too drained to do anything except scroll dully through social media until emotions return to him one by one. He steps back and stares blearily at Chikage’s chest. “Ah. Your shirt’s gross.”

“You’re gross.” Chikage hesitates, his hand hovering at Itaru’s side, and then pats the top of Itaru’s head. “I’m heading home anyway.”

“You let me keep you at work when you’re off?” Itaru starts to feel guilty. Just a pinch. 

“Maybe,” Chikage says. Now that he’s made contact with Itaru again, he doesn’t seem to want to let go, and so he lowers his hands to Itaru’s collar and fixes it for him. “I was going to come down and let you know not to wait for me at the end of the day. When I reached your department, I saw you heading for the bathroom, and followed you.”

There’s a lot to unpack there, and Itaru’s brain is too fried to do it. “You were coming to gloat about getting the afternoon off, is what you mean,” he says, allowing Chikage to fix his lapels too. 

“Maybe,” Chikage hums. He pats the front of Itaru’s jacket as if satisfied with his work, and drops his hands. “You could take the rest of the day off and come home with me, you know.”

The offer is _very_ tempting. Itaru considers it for all of two seconds. “No, I need to save my leave for ranking in two weeks...” He calls to mind the event banner with the Bedevere SSR. _Stay strong, taruchi_.

Chikage snorts. “Suit yourself.” He buttons up his suit jacket to cover the wet stains left from Itaru’s sad face, and reaches for the lock on the stall door. “Are you ready to go?”

“Ehh...” Itaru takes stock of his body. “How’s my face look?”

“Like you just cried in the bathroom,” Chikage says bluntly. “I trust you can fix that, though.”

“Do I look like the kind of guy who cries in bathrooms regularly?” Itaru grumbles, and puts his hand up quickly when Chikage opens his mouth. “ _Don’t_ answer that.” He’s already pulling a small tube of concealer from his pocket, which is answer enough. “Open the door.”

“Your arm,” Chikage says, reaching for the hand holding the concealer. Itaru looks down to find a bloody scratch on his wrist. Ah, when he bumped it on the cubicle. “You should wash this,” Chikage instructs, releasing Itaru’s hand after a moment of examination.

“Okay, oka~y.” 

When the lock clicks and the stall door swings open, Itaru follows Chikage out and makes a beeline for the sinks. In the mirror, he examines his face — not as blotchy as he feared! — and starts doing damage control with concealer and some splashed water from the sink. Chikage’s eyes are boring holes into his back, so he pointedly washes the scratch on his wrist too, wincing when it stings. 

A few minutes later, he’s presentable. He takes an extra few seconds to fix his bangs, too. Not like he’s immune to vanity. 

“Are you done,” Chikage drawls, examining his nails. 

“No one asked you to stay,” Itaru huffs. He tucks the concealer back away, though, and heads towards the door where Chikage is leaning. “You might as well go ahead. If we leave the bathroom together, it’ll look like something happened.”

“Ah,” Chikage says, and he looks down at Itaru with an expression Itaru can’t read. “Am I not handsome enough that you’d like it if people thought something happened?”

Itaru opens his mouth. 

“I’m joking,” Chikage says, and flashes a smile. “Don’t make such a dumb expression.” He pats Itaru’s cheek, and Itaru can’t help flinching in surprise. “I’ll leave first as requested. Nothing happened here at all, right?” He’s already turning the door handle, like once he leaves, what happened here will be sealed into its own secret moment in time. “See you at home, worker boy.”

The door swishes shut behind him. Itaru’s cheeks are burning. He turns back to the mirror and finds his concealer job hides the worst of his embarrassment. 

“What the hell,” he mutters. 

There’s a lot to unpack there, but Itaru’s just recovered his brain from whatever hell dimension it was trapped in. If Chikage’s gonna be weird, he can wait until Itaru’s off the clock, at _least_.

Hey, he’s still on the clock. He just cried for several minutes and got paid for it. That’s not bad. 

(Considering all the PTO he’s squandered on games... He’s gotten paid for worse.)

He waits the requisite minute, and then follows Chikage back out into the real world. 

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](http://twitter.com/futarinoshoutai)!


End file.
